Tell Nevada to stop funding the genocide in Darfur.
- by: ChampionDarfur.com
- recipient: Convince Nevada Public Employee Retirement System to divest
Currently the Nevada Public Employee Retirement System has roughly 1.3 million dollars invested into 2 companies that are listed as "Highest Offenders" on the Sudan Divestment Task Force list of offending companies. These companies are Alstom and Lundin Petroleum.
Alstom is participating in a hydroelectric dam project designed to bring power to the ruling elite and their supporters in Sudans capital, Khartoum. The project has forcibly displaced 50,000 local Sudanese, violated at dozens of international environmental standards, and its actions have resulted in the killing of local tribes protesting the project. Alstom has failed act to counter the terrible harm it is doing by supporting this power project.
Lundin Petroleum is based in Sweden and they provide service to government of Sudan to assist in the extraction, production, and refinement of Sudanese oil. In turn, 70% of revenue generated from these oil operations gets funneled into the Sudanese military, which then helps carry out the Darfur genocide.
The public employees of the state of Nevada, police officers, firefighters, and teachers included, should not have their future retirements funded by the profits of companies that are complacent to such horrible human rights violations.
We the undersigned strongly urge Nevada PERS to do its part in ending the atrocities in Sudan by divesting its funds from Lundin Petroleum and Alstom Corp.
It is well documented that in 2003 the government of Sudan began funding and arming a militia known as the Janjaweed to orchestrate a genocidal campaign against the population in the Darfur region. And for the last five years, the Janjaweed invaded villages throughout Darfur burning them to the ground, raping women and systematically killing hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children and displacing over two million more to other regions of Darfur and to neighboring Chad. Many of these refugees are not even receiving the most basic of human needs due to the danger faced by humanitarian relief workers at the hands of the Janjaweed.
Many states including California, Arizona, and Oregon have adopted the model of divestment offered by the Sudan Divestment Task Force or they have been adopted their own. The model of divestment offered by the Sudan Divestment Task force is carefully tailored to target only the worst offending companies that provide direct benefit to the government of Khartoum and are not engaged in humanitarian, health related, or religious activities in Sudan. These companies are identified through careful and deliberate research that is continually updated to ensure that it provides reliable and accurate information. This high quality research will be provided to PERS at no cost.
The divestment effort has been a bipartisan effort across the country, and some of the largest state PERS systems are participating. While Nevada does not have a large amount of funds invested in these offending companies the state of Nevada has an opportunity to take action against the genocide in Darfur.
Your participation in the divestment movement will add to the momentum and ultimately help end the genocide in Darfur. We strongly urge Nevada PERS to do its part in ending the atrocities in the Sudan.
Thank you.
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